Blog 6

My topic is an ethnographic study on fantasy writers. Instead of only focusing only on how fantasy writers work their magic, I also want to go over why they chose fantasy fiction as a genre. I know a handful of writers and know where to look for more that dwell in fantasy, so I can ask around writers questions like, "Why did you choose fantasy?", "How long have you been writing fantasy?", and "Is there something your stories always have to have to make it fantasy fiction?" I want to be able to cover the writers thoughts and choices since most of the focus in other studies have been on the readers.

Blog 5

Jottings:
- Nervous laughter (At start)
- Groups made and stuck with
- Forced to disperse
- Awkward ice breakers
- Basic conversation starters
     - Name
     - Major
-Uncomfortable situation in a semi-comfortable environment.

Headnotes:
Most notes were written rather than mentally noted.

Things I Remembered Later:
(Surprisingly, little to nothing.)
- Most of everyone started with Majors as an ice breaker, which was as long as I was left in a group for.
- Only one person started with, "How was your day?", which was Melanie
- Met with Melanie and John for the most time.
- I stayed back mostly to observe other groups, but I did participate in conversation.

Field Notes:
When assignment started, the first sound people made was nervous laughter while they had their eyes move around the room, looking at people. A few seconds in and people start the conversations, usually with names and majors, or general small talk. The groups changed here and there, but it seemed that most students preferred to stay in their groups unless told otherwise, which brought on more conversation starters that felt relatively awkward and uncomfortable. Pauses were made in conversations after a few minutes of speaking to take notes on each other. Conversations were clustered and difficult to understand due to people talking over each other. The overall atmosphere was generally uncomfortable, but proved to be humorous.

Blog 4

According to Swales, a discourse community follows six criteria in order to be deemed a discourse community. Considering these six criteria, let's see if this class is a discourse community.

1. A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals.

Each student is part of the class and has a set goal be it their own or pertaining to this class. Common goals would include passing the class and completing the class assignments.

2. A discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members.

The mechanisms used in class ranges from actual tools to basic interaction during group discussions and assignments. Actual tools that are used for communication between classmates include emails and the required blogs.

3. A discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback.

Classmates can see each other's blogs, since they are publicly posted online, and freely view and comment to provide feedback. Any blog posted is read by the professor in order to provide feedback after the due date of each blog post.

4. A discourse community utilizes and hence possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims.

Because our discourse community is a classroom discourse, it's already given two base genres: Student and Teacher. It may seem strange to count the titles as genres, but if you think about it, teachers or professors speak and communicate with students a certain way and vice-versa. Teachers are known to lecture, then speak to students in a manner help answer questions that the students may give, which are expected. In that case, genres can considered ethnicity and personalities as categories to label the way students speak in general.

5. In addition to owning genres, a discourse community has acquired some specific lexis. 

Day one, the professor gave students a group of words to be learned and used in assignments when analyzing readings. The lexis was given when the students first joined the discourse community, and it's their responsibility to learn the lexis throughout the course.

6. A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discoursal expertise.

The professor is already expected to have an understanding of the course and what is to be taught to the students. Because this course is in the middle of the english major, or path depending on the students actual major, they already should have some understanding of the course because of the previously taken courses, or prerequisites.

Considering the class in its entirety meets all the required criteria to some extent, the course is arguably a discourse community.

Blog 3

In a couple weeks, we've managed to run through a number of terms in the discussions. Known or not, they are to be learned to be used in further discussions. Those terms included:

1) Lexis - Language used within a discourse, or Jargon.

2) Discourse - Language in use, or Communication.

3) Discourse Community - A group of people that are members of a certain discourse and are familiar with the lexis within the discourse.

4) Analysis - The examination of an element in detail by explaining the pieces of the element to give the entire element meaning.

5) Genre - A categorization based on expected events or language.

These were only a few that were mostly mentioned. More terms were given during class, but of the many, these were the terms that were most used.